If you are struggling with incontinence, you may have started exploring options for treatment at home. Fortunately, there are many devices on the market that can help, but it may not be easy to decide to which one is right for you. Today we’re going to break down the similarities and differences of Elitone and other pelvic floor strengthening devices to help you make an educated decision about the best device for incontinence treatment for you.
Type of Pelvic Strengthening Devices
You’ve take the first step in improving your incontinence symptoms and stopping leaks – learning more about products that can help. First to consider are the right types of incontinence. If you leak when you sneeze, exercise, laugh, likely your pelvic floor muscles are weak and need to be strengthened. There are basically two main types of devices:
- Devices with sensors that give you feedback if you are contracting your muscles
- Devices stimulates the muscles and actually strengthen the muscles FOR YOU
5 Tips to Choose the Right Pelvic Floor Strengthening Device
Only the devices that stimulate muscles are true pelvic floor strengthening devices. That is what we will talk about from here. Devices that stimulate muscles do two things: because they elicit the muscle contraction they can 1) teach which muscles to activate, so you realize “Oh! That is how to do a kegel exercise!” Secondly, some women have so little muscle tone, that they can not squeeze the correct muscles enough to start to strengthen them, or they don’t have the time or effort to do it sufficiently.
Tip 1. Choose FDA-cleared devices
Since these devices are actively working your muscles, they are FDA-regulated medical devices. So ONLY choose FDA-cleared medical devices for incontinence. That means they have passed all safety and efficacy clinical and performance tests. (Beware of devices that only say they are FDA-registered
Tip 2. Choose external devices
Stimulation devices come both in intravaginal form and external form. They are both devices for incontinence that are used to stimulate and tone your pelvic floor muscles. Both treatments require less than 30 minutes of your day and stimulate your muscles using neuromuscular electrical stimulation. However, when you consider usability factors, internal devices require dedicated time, privacy, you have to lay still on your back (you can’t sit with electrical stimulation devices half in and half out!). Most of these e-stim devices end up staying in the drawer which does not help efficacy. Only Elitone delivers external stimulation to contract pelvic floor muscles.
Tip 3. Choose Wearability
The first is how the device is worn. Elitone is worn like a pad and simple to apply. This one size fits all device is discreetly placed directly beneath your pelvic floor, allowing you to easily continue about your day at home or work. The pad is activated with a small device that can be hidden on your waistband. This tip is similar to Tip 2 but was written when there was cumbersome shorts as an option (no longer!)
Tip 4. Choose Ease of Use & Cleanliness
Elitone is designed with the busy woman in mind. You can easily carry about your daily tasks while using Elitone. Elitone allows you to remain clothed during use and carry about your daily activities. Vaginal devices often carry risk of vaginal and bladder infections! One study had up to 20% infections with the vaginal devices.
Tip 5. Choose the Stimulation with dual use
While vaginal devices uses the similiar technology for electrical stimulation, it is targeted differently. The stimulation from Elitone is localized around where you need it: the urethra. The stimulation from Elitone is also capable of sending 1/3 of the signal to calm overactive bladder, so it is ideal for treating for mixed incontinence (both main types of incontinence which 35% of women have).
Additional Tips
Postpartum Timeline
Incontinence is common in many postpartum women. With Elitone, you can begin treatment at 6 weeks postpartum. With vaginal devices, you may need to wait 6 months after delivery before use.
Satisfaction Guarantee
At Elitone, we understand that knowing if a device is working for you takes time. That’s why we offer a 60 day guarantee. Most women see results within 6 weeks, so this is ample time to know if Elitone is effective. Often vaginal devices you cannot return them.
